IAIN Duncan Smith should resign and become a campaigner to end poverty according to the man credited with opening up the Work and Pension Secretary's eyes to deprivation.

Community worker Bob Holman, co-founder of the Family Action in Rogerfield and Easterhouse programme in Glasgow, argued Mr Duncan Smith was now blaming the poor for the Coalition's policy failures.

In 2002, the Secretary of State had his famous "Easterhouse epiphany" when he saw first hand the poverty many people live in.

The former Conservative Party then leader set up the Centre for Social Justice, an independent think-tank aimed at trying to tackle the root causes of poverty.

However, Mr Holman said Mr Duncan Smith is now "claiming that poverty was not due to a lack of money but was the result of bad parenting, drug and alcohol addiction, laziness, and the break-up of families".

He said the Secretary of State, under pressure to make cuts, decided to "divert blame away from his policy failures...[and] at the poor themselves."

Mr Holman said the Work and Pensions Secretary's analysis was wrong as most poor people were in work and not on benefits.

He said Mr Duncan Smith should "resign and become a campaigner for the end of poverty". Mr Holman added: "As a Conservative, he would reach a different audience."